Ezekiel 42
1 [in the vision] the man led me out of the inner courtyard, through [the entrance on] the north side. We entered the outer courtyard and came to a building that was built against the north [of the inner courtyard].
And he took me out into the inner square in the direction of the north: and he took me into the rooms which were opposite the separate place and opposite the building to the north.
2 That building was (175 feet/53 meters) long and (87-1/2 feet/26.5 meters) wide. Its doorway faced north.
On the north side it was a hundred cubits long and fifty cubits wide,
3 In that building were two rows of rooms, built on three levels, that faced each other. One row of rooms was built against the wall of the inner courtyard, and the other row was built against the wall facing the outer courtyard. The building was 34 feet from the temple.
Opposite the space of twenty cubits which was part of the inner square, and opposite the stone floor of the outer square. There were covered ways facing one another on the third floor.
4 Between the [two] rows of rooms there was a walkway that was (17-1/2 feet/5.3 meters) wide and (175 feet/53 meters) long. All its doors were on the north side.
And in front of the rooms was a walk, ten cubits wide and a hundred cubits long; and their doors were facing north.
5 Each of the upper rows of rooms was narrower than the row of rooms below them, [because the upper rows needed to have a walkway in front of them].
And the higher rooms were shorter: for the covered ways took up more space from these than from the lower and middle rooms.
6 The rooms on the upper levels had no pillars to support them like the ones in the courtyard. Instead, each of those row of rooms were supported by the walls of the row of rooms on the level below.
For they were on three floors, and they had no pillars like the pillars of the outer square; so the highest was narrower than the lowest and middle floors from the earth level.
7 The wall of the building extended (87-1/2 feet/26.5 meters) past the set of rooms built along the outer courtyard, separating all the rooms from the outer courtyard.
And the wall which went outside by the side of the rooms, in the direction of the outer square in front of the rooms, was fifty cubits long.
8 The row of rooms that were along the outer courtyard was (87-1/2 feet/26.5 meters) long, and the set of rooms that faced the temple was (175 feet/53 meters) long.
For the rooms in the outer square were fifty cubits long: and in front of the Temple was a space of a hundred cubits.
9 The lowest row of rooms had an entrance from the outer courtyard, on the east side.
And under these rooms was the way in from the east side, as one goes into them from the outer square at the head of the outer wall.
10 On the south [side], along the wall of the outer courtyard, next to the temple courtyard, was a [a building with two] rows of rooms,
(And he took me) to the south, and in front of the separate place and in front of the building there were rooms.
11 with a walkway between them. Those rooms were like the rooms on the north [side]: they were the same length and width, and had the same kind of entrances.
And there was a walk in front of them like that by the rooms on the north; they were equally long and wide; and the ways out of them were the same in design and had the same sort of doors.
12 The doorways on the south side were similar to the doorways on the north side. There was an entrance in the wall that faced the doors of the set of rooms, and there was an entrance on the east side, at the end of the inside walkway.
And under the rooms on the south was a door at the head of the outer wall in the direction of the east as one goes in.
13 Then the man said to me, “These rooms that overlook the temple on the north and south sides are holy. Here the priests who offer sacrifices to Yahweh will [their portions of] the sacred offerings. Because these rooms are holy, they will be used to store the sacred offerings: [the grain for] the grain offerings, the offerings for the sins that people have committed, and offerings in order that people will no longer be guilty for having sinned.
And he said to me, The north rooms and the south rooms in front of the separate place are the holy rooms, where the priests who come near the Lord take the most holy things for their food: there the most holy things are placed, with the meal offering and the sin-offering and the offering for error; for the place is holy.
14 When the priests leave the temple, they will not be allowed to [immediately] enter the outer courtyard. First, they must remove the clothes that they had been wearing inside the temple, because those clothes are holy. They must put on other clothes before they enter the parts [of the temple area] where the [other] people [gather].”
When the priests go in, they may not go out of the holy place into the outer square, and there they are to put the robes in which they do the work of the Lord's house, for they are holy: and they have to put on other clothing before they come near that which has to do with the people.
15 When the man had finished measuring the inside of the temple area, he led me out through the east entrance [of the outer courtyard] and measured all the way around the temple area.
And when he had come to the end of measuring the inner house, he took me out to the doorway looking to the east, and took its measure all round.
16 He measured the four sides of the area. There was a wall around the area that was (875 feet/265 meters) long on each side.
He went round and took the measure of it on the east side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.
And he went round and took the measure of it on the north side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.
And he went round and took the measure of it on the south side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.
And he went round and took the measure of it on the west side with the measuring rod, five hundred, measured with the rod all round.
20 That wall separated the [area which was] sacred/holy from the [areas that were] not sacred.
He took its measure on the four sides: and it had a wall all round, five hundred long and five hundred wide, separating what was holy from what was common.
